There’s a shift happening in our culture. We’re moving into becoming a ‘feel-good’ society where everyone is promoting ‘yea follow your dreams’ or ‘yea pursue your passion, because you’ll live your life happier’. However, no one really speaks to the real significance of passion and dreams. No one really talks about what happens when it becomes a apart of the human experience.

If you listen carefully you’ll note that many of those things MLK ‘saw’, didn’t exist at that time. And the one thing that allows us to think of something that doesn’t exist or imagine something we may not have never experienced is our imagination. MLK didn’t predict the future, he created it. Dreams give you the power to do that. Because a dream is our imagination creating a focal point in the future giving our effort direction. Dreams aren’t so much things we desire to have, but futures we desire to create.

So think about your life now. Is your effort pointed towards the focal point created by your imagination? Or do you live your life driving around with an unknown destination?

It’s interesting how failing and being a failure aren’t as closely related as we think. Failure is a condition or a state of mind. But failing lasts a moment. Failure is a choice. Spielberg failed to get into University of Southern California. Michael Jordan failed to make his highschool basketball team. Founder of Pandora.com failed to get investors 300 times. James Dyson failed several times at creating prototypes of his vacuum cleaner. All failed but none were failures. Why? Because they refused to give up. We’re trained to see failing as undesirable, but should it be? What if we saw failing as an opportunity? A redirection? Something that says ‘that way didn’t work, try a different one’. Our scope has become very narrow. Let me paint a picture for you:

Thomas Edison. An American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. On his journey to developing the light bulb there were many times his attempts were unsuccessful, but he saw a bigger picture. I want you to really think about the disappointment he must have experienced those 1,093 times he failed. I’ve put on events and workshops that weren’t successful, I lost a lot of money, and I definitely can’t imagine doing that 1,093 times. But those times that I failed I saw a bigger picture. My endgame was to put on successful events and workshops. And just because I failed at a few, doesn’t mean my end goal is no longer attainable.

What separates the failure from those that have failed is hope. If I knew without the shadow of a doubt I couldn’t do something then I wouldn’t try. But even if I had a mustard seed of hope, then I would give it another shot. Keeping in mind Einstein says something remarkable “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Failing should be seen as redirection, not an opportunity to try the same thing, the same way. You need to learn from it. So the next time you fail, just see it as an opportunity to try the same thing a different way. Because you can fail everyday in your life and still never be a failure. But you have to get back up again.

“Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail.”

Steven Spielberg was rejected from his dream school, the University of Southern California, three times. Marilyn Monroe’s first contract with Columbia Pictures expired because they told her she wasn’t pretty or talented enough to be an actress. R.H. Macy had a history failing businesses, including a dud Macy’s in New York City, N.Y. After Sidney Poitier’s first audition, the casting director instructed him to just stop wasting everyone’s time and ‘get a job as a dishwasher or something. Albert Einstein didn’t speak until age four and didn’t read until age seven. His teachers labelled him ‘slow’ and ‘mentally handicapped.’ But Einstein just had a different way of thinking. Oprah Winfrey was fired from her television reporting job because they told her she wasn’t fit to be on screen. Henry Ford’s first auto company went out of business. He abandoned a second because of a fight and a third went downhill because of declining sales.

Seven different people. Seven different circumstances of adversity. Have you ever wondered why many of the greats were able to press through so much? Or why they were able to stand up against the odds and choose to keep going? Or were humiliated but never allowed that to stop them? One word: Passion!

You may find it surprising that the brain of a person who is passionate fires and responds remarkably similar to the brain of someone in love. And contrary to popular beliefs, love doesn’t happen in the heart. It happens in the brain.

It is often believed that when you are in love, most regions of your brain activate, though this is partially true, many areas of your brain actually deactivate. Areas such as the amygdala; associated with fear and aversion to risk. Doesn’t it strike you as odd that before someone falls in love they’re afraid to get hurt and they see all these risks. But the moment they fall in love, many times the risks are no longer at the forefront? Keep in mind that the risks are still present, but it is no longer the focus. And this is because the area in the brain responsible for fear and aversion to risk fires less. The same applies to the the person who is passionate. It is easy to identify someone who lacks passion because they are the ones who are afraid to pursue. They are the ones who lean more towards the risks of a venture than the benefits. But the passionate person can acknowledge the risk, but continue to press onward, not because they have a strength not known to the other, but because specific areas in their brain that controls this function deactivates.

So back to the original question; Have you ever wondered why many of the greats were able to press through so much? Or why they were able to stand up against the odds and choose to keep going? Or were humiliated but never allowed that to stop them?

It is because passion, like love, causes pain centers in the brain to fire less. So the person who is passionate is able press through adversity easier (not easily) than someone who is is not. And this is why when we watch the television show Dragons Den, and see passionate entrepreneurs put everything on the line, finance from their mortgage, sell their homes and downsize to use the money, take out loans, use up their personal savings, borrow from friends.Just to have Kevin O’leary say “this is a stupid idea, and you will never see success’

We wonder how they can walk out being completely embarrassed on National Television, but say in their closing remarks that ‘I’m not going to give up on this, because I believe in it.’, while even we sit at home and say ‘this guys crazy’. It’s because those pain centers aren’t firing the same as they do in someone who is not passionate.

People need to understand that passion is more than just another stream of revenue. It’s so much more than something we can turn into a profession. Passion is a resource we are given to bring us to greatness. Try and imagine anything great accomplished on this planet without passion. This is why many of us will continue to live mediocre lives and never once tap into what it means to be great, because we lack the very thing that we need to get there. When passion converges with the human experience, it gives birth to a different you. It creates a more productive you, a more resilient you and a more focused you.

The mistake that we make is that we define passion to be the ‘thing’ we’re interested in. So we’ll say stuff like ‘my passion is music’, or ‘my passion is business”. But thats not what passion is. We confuse passion to be the ‘interest’, when in fact they’re two separate entities. Passion is a capacity that we’re all born with. So when people say they want to ‘find or discover their passion’, what they’re really saying is they want to find the interest that will ignite the passion laying dormant inside them.

The Passionate Life is a workshop that will give you a completely different perspective on passion. It will show you how passion at its core is designed to take our lives to the next level, if we learn how to tap into it.

We believe that patience is the ability to wait, but I think its deeper than that. Patience comes from the Latin word ‘pati’, which means to suffer or endure. So patience isn’t just an ability to wait, its an ability to suffer. Knowing that something is for you, and having to suffer everyday without it until its finally yours. So no wonder patience is a virtue not possessed by many, because it takes strength, hope and determination.

Many times leaders intimidate their colleagues with their title and power when they walk into a room. Successful leaders deflect attention away from themselves and encourage others to voice their opinions. They are experts at making others feel safe to speak-up and confidently share their perspectives and points of view. They use their executive presence to create an approachable environment.

2. Make Decisions

Successful leaders are expert decision makers. They either facilitate the dialogue to empower their colleagues to reach a strategic conclusion or they do it themselves. They focus on “making things happen” at all times – decision making activities that sustain progress. Successful leaders have mastered the art of politicking and thus don’t waste their time on issues that disrupt momentum. They know how to make 30 decisions in 30 minutes.

I find that in many companies today, there are a lot of great managers (and poor ones), but also some really horrible leaders. I often say that we blur the line between management and leadership. They are not the same.

I work for a company that focuses on training managers and does nothing with developing the leader in them. Granted not everyone may have what it takes to be an effective leader, but I believe that there are certain principles of leadership that many people can apply on the job, especially those in management positions.

At my workplace, I got tired of complaining that there are no effective leaders within the company and for the most part there are just mediocre managers. So I decided to launch a program, that focused on developing leaders within my restaurant, and not just training people to become managers. And because I primarily work with young people it is great that leadership skills are being instilled in them at this point in there life.

I’ve decided to open this program up to other managers that want to make that transition from being mediocre managers or bosses to effective leaders. Simply because, as companies begin to tap into the potential of their people more and more, managers need to learn to manage talent and inspire action; not demand it. And that is at the cornerstone of leadership.

More details to follow as to locations, and I’m going to try and make sure it will be free of charge. 🙂